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the second.
Before being a Republican Baudin had been a tutor. He came from that
intelligent and brave race of schoolmasters ever persecuted, who have
fallen from the Guizot Law into the Falloux Law, and from the Falloux
Law into the Dupanloup Law. The crime of the schoolmaster is to hold a
book open; that suffices, the Church condemns him. There is now, in
France, in each village, a lighted torch--the schoolmaster--and a mouth
which blows upon it--the curé. The schoolmasters of France, who knew how
to die of hunger for Truth and for Science, were worthy that one of
their race should be killed for Liberty.
The first time that I saw Baudin was at the Assembly on January 13,
1
850. I wished to speak against the Law of Instruction. I had not put my
name down; Baudin's name stood second. He offered me his turn. I
accepted, and I was able to speak two days afterwards, on the 15th.
Baudin was one of the targets of Sieur Dupin, for calls to order and
official annoyances. He shared this honor with the Representatives Miot
and Valentin.
Baudin ascended the Tribune several times. His mode of speaking,
outwardly hesitating, was energetic in the main. He sat on the crest of
the Mountain. He had a firm spirit and timid manners. Thence there was in
his constitution an indescribable embarrassment, mingled with decision.
He was a man of middle height. His face ruddy and full, his broad chest,
his wide shoulders announced the robust man, the laborer-schoolmaster,
the peasant-thinker. In this he resembled Bourzat. Baudin leaned his head
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